Arup’s dramatic exercise at Vauxhall
Underground station and bus interchange
(Amp Associates, 2005) strives for iconic exuberance, almost literally waving, “Hey, I’m here…!” It is very simple: a control building set above the underground station itself and an axial run of bus stops that run down the road for a considerable length, all of it in bright stainless steel. To the immediate south is the rail tracks coming into Waterloo; to the north-west is EPR’s exercise in tall apartment blocks; and to the north-east is Farrell’s MI6 fortress. So, the Vauxhall station completes a trio of peculiarities. Whether it’s wonderful or ridiculous is hardly for this bemused author to say.. Pay it a visit and make up your own mind.
This IMAX 500 seat cinema (Waterloo Station / Bridge; Brian Avery Associates, 1999) is a comparatively simple and clean statement. It takes the form of a glass drum sat within the centre of a large traffic roundabout (but accessed at a lower level, from the Southbank) and has thus become an instant, self-advertising land-mark of the kind that is still quite rare in London. It is also an important part of proposals to renew and revitalise the whole of the South Bank cultural area. The photo shows the building in context (Farrell’s Embankment Place can be seen across the river, at the top left). Unfortunately, they clothe the outer face of the drum in art, as if this were somehow better than plain architecture, a celebration of cinema, or even advertising.
(See photo bottom right for what it was like when just constructed.)